Ice fishing, Washington
Hog Canyon Lake is producing trout 7-14 inches through 7 inches of ice. The bite is usually early and best results come if the bait is slowly jigged. Yellow corn has been popular. At Fourth of July, the bite is also on and fish are consistently more than a foot long.
Perch are showing in better numbers in the boat basin at Coulee City, but the best bite is before noon. Banks Lake froze all the way across earlier this week, except in the bays, ice is not thick enough to be safe. Fair catches are coming near the public access at Newman and Waitts. Eloika remains good north of Jerry’s Landing. The key to successful ice fishing is to move until you find fish. Sometimes the first hole will do it, but usually you need several tries. There has been no one “best time” at Eloika, though there is usually a flurry of action beginning around 4 p.m.
Patterson Lake in Winthrop is starting to provide some hard water success for 7- to 8-inch perch, with a few approaching 10 inches.
Ice fishing opportunities for rainbow trout in Okanogan County include Rat Lake near Brewster, Big and Little Green lakes near Omak, and Sidley or Molson lakes near Oroville.
Ice fishing, Idaho
Fernan Lake ice fishing is slow, but perch size is good at 9-10 inches. At Rose Lake, ice is 12 inches thick, but the pike bite has not materialized.
Hayden Lake pike anglers are getting a few small pike. The best fishing has been to the left of the launch about 100 yards from shore.
Open water opportunities
Fishing for rainbow and brown trout from shore or boat remains good at year-round Rock Lake in Whitman County.
WDFW fish biologist Jason McLellan reported fishing for big net-pen-reared rainbow trout on Lake Roosevelt is picking up on the lower end of the reservoir near Spring Canyon just east of Grand Coulee Dam. Roosevelt anglers are also catching an occasional kokanee or two. Elsewhere on the reservoir, anglers are not finding a lot of fish. Reports this week indicate those taken are below the surface – down as far as 15 feet.
Rufus Woods Reservoir is still kicking out triploid rainbows. Fishing isn’t as fast as a month ago, but it’s still the best game in town. Dark-colored jigs, spinners and plugs seem to be most effective, but Jan. 17, Nick Burger of Spokane caught a 22-pounder while drifting a white tube jig.
Trolled Wooly Bugger flies are also good from the surface down to 30 feet.
The area above the narrows on Lake Chelan has begun to heat up for big Mackinaw with fish averaging upward of 9 pounds. The lower basin continues to be excellent for eater-sized lakers.
Mackinaw are in their spawning colors and fishing on Priest Lake has been excellent. The fish have been mostly running 4-7 pounds. The Indian Creek ramp is in good shape, but it is advised you take a bucket of sand.
Walleye anglers jigging below Rocky Reach Dam on the Columbia report hot action and some big fish from 30-35 feet of water. There are also favorable reports from anglers jigging a mile upstream of the blue bridge on the Pasco side of the Columbia. The Washington State record walleye was caught last year from the Columbia above McNary Dam in early February.
Steelhead
Snake River steelheading is cold and slow, as is that in the Clearwater.
Cold temperatures on the upper Columbia River above Wells Dam have slowed the steelhead fishing in the last few weeks. The Okanogan, Methow and Similkameen tributaries are largely unfishable because of ice. Bob Jateff, WDFW district fish biologist from Omak, noted that there are still fish being caught on the mainstem Columbia in and near Pateros.
On Bonneville and The Dalles pools, boat anglers sampled averaged a steelhead per rod. At Ringold, angler activity has slowed. WDFW has interviewed 47 anglers with 11 steelhead in January. Anglers are averaging one steelhead for every 15 hours of fishing with boat anglers doing considerably better than bank anglers.
West Side river conditions have improved dramatically and steelhead fishing has picked up as a result, said Mike Gross, a fish biologist for WDFW.
Both hatchery and wild steelhead returns are down in the North Puget Sound area this year, particularly to rivers in the Skagit River basin. Fishing has been only fair.
Hunting
The Washington waterfowl season ends Sunday, but hunters heading out for one final try are not likely to find much close to home. Geese, here in good numbers before the last storm, appear to have vacated the premises. There are reports of mallard concentrations on the Snake River near Central Ferry and on the Columbia near the Tri-Cities.
WDFW waterfowl specialist Mikal Moore said that despite the cold weather, there is still good duck and goose hunting in the Columbia Basin.
There are a number of corn stubble fields in the Basin enrolled in the “Corn Stubble Retention Program.” These fields are walk-in hunting only. Call the North Central regional office in Ephrata at (509) 754-4624 for more information.